Science fiction turns fact as ‘internet of things’ draws closer
Fascinating piece which started with Bill Gates predicting intelligent fridges becomes ever more a reality – The Guardian
Bobbie Johnson, San Francisco
guardian.co.uk, Monday 1 March 2010 09.00 GMT
Advertising that uses advanced technology – explored in the film Minority Report – is one use of an internet of things
The idea of a world where even mundane objects like shoes and food can be connected to the internet may sound like a plot culled from Hollywood – but a new report suggests that it is fast becoming reality.
An analysis from the McKinsey consultancy suggests that the “internet of things” – where everyday devices are able to send information over the web – is closer than ever, resulting in a series of new technological and social advances.
Using a variety of technologies, including Wi-Fi and RFID – the electronic chip system used in the Oyster card – all sorts of objects will soon be able will be able to feed data back about their position, status and location. A successful internet of things could help people keep track of their actions or help businesses improve efficiency, it suggests.
And while McKinsey accepts that such systems still have some way to go, the report says that the pieces of the puzzle are now falling into place.
“The widespread adoption of the internet of things will take time, but the time line is advancing thanks to improvements in underlying technologies,” it says.
“Ever-smaller silicon chips for this purpose are gaining new capabilities, while costs – following the pattern of Moore’s Law – are falling. Massive increases in storage and computing power, some of it available via cloud computing, make number crunching possible at very large scale and at declining cost.”
Many technologists have been working on such systems, largely through small-scale experiments and pilot projects aimed at exploring the boundaries. Current work in the area is being done by telecommunications companies including Alcatel and Nokia, as well as academic institutions such as MIT – which ran a scheme to track rubbish in Seattle as a way of checking the effectiveness of the city’s waste removal and recycling services.
The McKinsey report suggests areas for future growth such as the creation of complicated systems that can act independently of an operator, as well as other developments in tracking, decision-making and automation.
The concept of so-called “ubiquitous computing” has long been a favourite subject for science fiction authors, but recent developments have made the concept of embedded, connected – and even intelligent – devices much more like a reality than a fantasy.
The writer and futurist Bruce Sterling coined the idea of “spime” – physical objects that can be tracked through GPS and interact with their environments using RFID. Meanwhile Adam Greenfield, an information architect and designer now working for Nokia, developed many concepts at the heart of the movement in his 2006 book Everyware.
While some of the ideas in the report bear all the hallmarks of fiction, its authors point out that many of these technologies are already in use.
“Pill-shaped micro-cameras already traverse the human digestive tract and send back thousands of images to pinpoint sources of illness,” they write.
“Precision farming equipment with wireless links to data collected from remote satellites and ground sensors can take into account crop conditions and adjust the way each individual part of a field is
farmed—for instance, by spreading extra fertiliser on areas that need more nutrients.”
The internet of things is not without its problems, however. Two years ago scientists demonstrated that could use radio signals to hack into pacemakers – effectively taking control of a life-saving technology that had been implanted inside a patient’s body.
McKinsey’s report suggests that companies working on such ideas must examine a number of areas, including privacy, security and data protection.
